Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
I am the good shepherd,
my sheep listen to my voice,
and they become
one flock and one fold.
.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Mark 1, 40-45
A man suffering from a virulent skin-disease came to him and pleaded on his knees saying, 'If you are willing, you can cleanse me.'
Feeling sorry for him, Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him and said to him, 'I am willing. Be cleansed.'
And at once the skin-disease left him and he was cleansed.
And at once Jesus sternly sent him away and said to him,
'Mind you tell no one anything, but go and show yourself to the priest, and make the offering for your cleansing prescribed by Moses as evidence to them.'
The man went away, but then started freely proclaiming and telling the story everywhere, so that Jesus could no longer go openly into any town, but stayed outside in deserted places. Even so, people from all around kept coming to him.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
I give you a new commandment,
that you love one another.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
To whom else could this leper go but Jesus? While people were all keeping him aside being afraid of contagion, Jesus welcomed him. It is an emblematic scene that represents how Jesus relates to the weak. The very numerous crowd of all those who still today have no hope for healing or who are kept aside by others for fear of contagion are present in that leper. At times, they are not only individuals, but actually entire peoples who are excluded from development. The leper asked for healing from Jesus, the only one who did not keep him away. Finally, he found the one who did not keep away from the weak and the poor; on the contrary, Jesus welcomed them and went towards them, even to the point of privileging them. Furthermore, Jesus touched that leper who was considered untouchable by the law. And he healed him, giving him back the dignity of the body and that of being able to live with all others without being discriminated. Shouldn’t the many lepers of today find in us, disciples of Jesus, the same trust they put in the young prophet from Nazareth? The evangelist Mark notes that when Jesus saw the leper, he was "moved with pity." This is the origin of the miracle: to be moved with pity for the poor, for the weak, for the sick. That leper intuited that the young prophet had a good heart and was strong: he was the only one, thus, who could save him. Jesus listened to the prayer of the leper and said to him: "I do choose. Be made clean!" And the leprosy left him. The man, now full of joy, could not help spreading the news, and communicated his overwhelming joy. This Gospel scene is announced to us so that we may listen to the cry of the poor as Jesus did, and so that with his help, we may work miracles as well as he did.
Prayer is the heart of the life of the Community of Sant'Egidio and is its absolute priority. At the end of the day, every the Community of Sant'Egidio, large or small, gathers around the Lord to listen to his Word. The Word of God and the prayer are, in fact, the very basis of the whole life of the Community. The disciples cannot do other than remain at the feet of Jesus, as did Mary of Bethany, to receive his love and learn his ways (Phil. 2:5).
So every evening, when the Community returns to the feet of the Lord, it repeats the words of the anonymous disciple: " Lord, teach us how to pray". Jesus, Master of prayer, continues to answer: "When you pray, say: Abba, Father". It is not a simple exhortation, it is much more. With these words Jesus lets the disciples participate in his own relationship with the Father. Therefore in prayer, the fact of being children of the Father who is in heaven, comes before the words we may say. So praying is above all a way of being! That is to say we are children who turn with faith to the Father, certain that they will be heard.
Jesus teaches us to call God "Our Father". And not simply "Father" or "My Father". Disciples, even when they pray on their own, are never isolated nor they are orphans; they are always members of the Lord's family.
In praying together, beside the mystery of being children of God, there is also the mystery of brotherhood, as the Father of the Church said: "You cannot have God as father without having the church as mother". When praying together, the Holy Spirit assembles the disciples in the upper room together with Mary, the Lord's mother, so that they may direct their gaze towards the Lord's face and learn from Him the secret of his Heart.
The Communities of Sant'Egidio all over the world gather in the various places of prayer and lay before the Lord the hopes and the sufferings of the tired, exhausted crowds of which the Gospel speaks ( Mat. 9: 3-7 ), In these ancient crowds we can see the huge masses of the modern cities, the millions of refugees who continue to flee their countries, the poor, relegated to the very fringe of life and all those who are waiting for someone to take care of them. Praying together includes the cry, the invocation, the aspiration, the desire for peace, the healing and salvation of the men and women of this world. Prayer is never in vain; it rises ceaselessly to the Lord so that anguish is turned into hope, tears into joy, despair into happiness, and solitude into communion. May the Kingdom of God come soon among people!
For the sick, in memory of the dead, for peace
